


poetry by dead men

by solid-no-on-that-on (DragonsAddicted)



Series: of goddesses and spirits and all lost things [4]
Category: Linked Universe - Fandom, The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time
Genre: Bittersweet, Linked Universe (Legend of Zelda), obligatory ghost fic, thank you linni for your amazing ideas honestly it’s radical
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-15
Updated: 2019-07-08
Packaged: 2020-03-05 17:55:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18833767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DragonsAddicted/pseuds/solid-no-on-that-on
Summary: Time sees a truth he perhaps never realized he needed to see.(In which Wild and Link were never the same, and Time’s eye isn’t as blind as he makes it out to be)Edit: Chapter 2, in which there's a meeting that's 100 years overdue





	1. a good dream, almost

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fic and chapter titles from the Sara Bareilles song “Poetry By Dead Men”. Enjoy!

 

      Wild has a ghost following him.

      

      At least, Time _thinks_ its a ghost. He’s never seen a ghost before. He only sees glimpses of it through the sliver of his always closed eye. While he never dares open it enough to see a face, he always catches glimpses of a translucent hand and what was once a colorful gauntlet. The hands are impossibly still even as they move around, always seeming to be present around Wild.

 

      Power wasn’t the only thing that the Fierce Deity gave him.

 

      He gave him power and gave him the truth, the gift to see the world as it truly was. It was the closest Time had ever gotten to the gift of wisdom that Zelda possessed, and it was the closest Time ever wanted to get.

 

      The truth has a price, after all.

 

      He was able to see the dark magic that his protege carried in his very bones, hear the whispers of the mask in his bag, getting heavier by the day, and feel the power resonating from the sword that lay so innocently on Sky’s back. 

 

      He has seen the spark of life fade out of a hundred warriors’ eyes, seen the _bright, far too bright_ light, as it shone within every one of his companions. The same light every Zelda held within them.

 

      The same light that Hylia emanated.

 

      So he chose not to see it, he learned to tune out the noise and suppress the shivers in a hope that he could block out at least _something_. By the time Legend had joined their merry band, Time kept his eye permanently closed, away from the brightness and away from the truth.

 

      But an eye is an eye and an eye tries to see.

 

      Time sometimes can’t help but open it when his terrors haunt the dreaming world. When memories of a moon and the masks and the haunting tune of the Song of Time keep him from sleeping and make him forget, even for a moment, to block out the truth.

 

      It is on one of these nights that everything changes.

 

      He’s lying away from the group, the only person in front of him being Wild. When both his eyes rip open in an effort to free himself of a nightmare, they land on Wild and his ghost.

 

      Instead of closing his eye immediately, as he usually does when his sight is greeting by the blinding brightness of the soul-light, his eye, so long closed, drinks in the image before him.

 

      He can see smooth skin and short blonde hair tied back in a pony tail and he can see a glow reminiscent of the glow he saw in the people lying behind him before he closed his eye, bright and gold and oh so beautiful.

 

      He almost doesn’t register the ghost’s identity until he looks at it’s garb. It wears a white undershirt under a tunic that has a sword insignia embroidered into the collar.

 

      A blue tunic.

 

      A _very familiar_ blue tunic. 

 

      Glancing down at Wild, he looks in horror as he sees the facial features of the ghost reflected. His hair is longer, and his face is marred by scars, but the hair color matches, the facial placement identical, the tunic’s twin exactly the same.

 

      It takes a second for Time’s tired brain to realize who the ghost is. 

 

      It takes another to realize Wild isn’t glowing at all.

 

      Time’s eyes flick to the ghost, to verify it’s still there, to make sure what he’s seeing—or rather, what he’s _not_ — is real.

 

      When the ghost’s eyes, still alight with that damn celestial light, look into his, Time knows that his eyes do not betray him. Perhaps they weren’t able to.

 

      The ghost smiles sadly and looks down at its charge, still slumbering peacefully despite the scene playing out above him. With a huff, it stands, and raises its head to meet Time’s eye, starting to walk towards him.

 

            “Hello, Time.”

 

      Its voice is melodic, more soothing than his counterpart, and quieter. Abruptly, it-no, _he-_ stops and extends his hand out, an unexpected courtesy given the circumstances.

 

            “My name is Link.”

 

      And with that, Time, for perhaps the first time in a long time, truly sees. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!!! 
> 
> I had a blast writing this. Technically, I wrote two versions of a ghost fic, but the first one I didn’t like so much and didn’t really match my narrative style. It also had some body horror and that’s not for everyone. 
> 
> This is meant to be entirely unrelated to my other fic with Time and Hylia, but if you read them in the same universe, they could feasibly be connected! I like to leave a lot to reader interpretation so read it however you want. 
> 
> If it wasn’t clear in the fic, which it may not be, the “lights” are supposed to be people’s souls. When Link died in BoTW, he, well, died. His soul left his body but stayed around. Wild woke up 100 years later with no memories, and he wasn’t really Link anymore, but someone new. 
> 
> This was a mutation of Linni’s “Wild is a redead” Hc from the Linked Universe discord server, so thank her for the inspiration!


	2. how can i make you remember

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A meeting long overdue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello lads, welcome to part 2. i've never done one before so this'll be new.
> 
> thank you to all the lovely commenters for this fic! it was really the positive response from the previous chapter that really made me want to write this.

At his core, Wild is a survivalist.

 

His instincts are constantly turned up to an 11, his eyes always searching, his ears picking out even the quietest of whispers in bushes and trees that not even Twi can detect.

 

So of course, Wild knows that something is following him.

 

He doesn’t necessarily know what. The feeling of being watched, a sense that he isn’t alone, has been with him for his entire journey. He chalked it up to Zelda or Ganon, but Zelda is free now and Ganon is gone and the feeling still persists.As of recently he’s become more actively aware of it. Occasionally he’ll catch a pale hand in the corner of his eye, and when he turns around, the hand—and the person presumably attached to it—is gone.

 

Distantly, he wonders if it’s someone he knew.

 

Distantly, he wonders if it’s his mother.

 

He knows that Time knows something, but Time seems to know a lot of things he shouldn’t.

 

Sometimes Wild can hear him whispering to someone on nights when the moon is full and bright (or close to it). Wild himself doesn’t wake up: he has a form of sleep paralysis that he’s only learned to adjust to with time. The heavy feeling of his body used to remind him of waking up in a blue room with blue light and blank mind . Enough heavy blankets and big, grey, wolves with markings that like to lay on him have fo the most part rewritten those memories, but he’ll always remember. He’ll never forget.

 

Wild can’t make out the words of the conversation next to him but he knows that Time isn’t talking to Twilight.

 

While Time’s voice is clearly present, the responding voice is one that he knows is unfamiliar. While it is a stranger, he doesn’t feel particularly threatened by it. The voice is soothing to him, like the faded memories of his family that he can no longer clearly remember.

 

He wonders if he’s just dreaming, so he doesn’t comment on it, keeps quiet, and keeps musing on what, to him, seems like the weirdest repeating dream he’s ever had.

 

Once, when the conversation in the group turned to the topic, he laughs about it and tells him that he hallucinates Time having conversations late at night in his dreams. The others poke fun and make lewd jokes at him for dreaming about one of their companions, but the subject soon fades away, the mirth faded and, to almost all of them, is long forgotten.

 

Wild doesn’t miss how Time’s breath caught in his throat, the way his eyes went wide and his body stiffened like a rabbit in the face of a galloping horse.

 

The following night, when all the others were asleep, for the first timesince this whole thing had started, Wild stays awake.

 

He fakes being asleep, of course. He gets the feeling that if he even gives the slightest sign of being awake then nothing will happen, and the jig will be up.

 

Before the moon rises and the night is still dark, he learns many things about the other’s sleeping routines. Warriors tends to snore, Legend is out early, Sky likes to cuddle, mainly with Hyrule, who accepts the company, and Wind sprawls in a starfish position while Four sleeps on his stomach.

 

He also learns that Twi likes to disappear into the woods late at night, presumably going on patrol to protect him and the rest of them from curious predators and relentless enemies.

 

Maybe wolves need less sleep. Wild doesn’t know.

 

Like clockwork, when the moon rises high in the sky he hears Time startle awake, his breathing quickening, and his soft groan.

 

And then he hears it.

 

_The other voice._

 

There’s the start of a whispered conversation, quiet in the still of night, and all seems to be the norm for their nightly meetings, except for one thing.

 

This time, Wild is awake.

 

This time, he has the presence of mind to hear them.

 

“Tell him”

 

It’s Time’s voice. He sounds irritated, but commanding nonetheless. Wild has been on the other side of that voice, body following the command of someone who is far too used to military orders and commanders and war, someone who he doesn’t know anymore but whose muscles remember every drill and every drop of sweat.

 

“I will. Just...just not yet.”

 

It’s a voice he’s heard before, he knows. It’s melodic in a way that his own, still husky and raspy from 100 years of disuse, could never be.

 

He’s only heard it once before, in distant memories of a time long past. It’s a voice that used to pray to the goddess on behalf of himself, his people, his princess.

 

He couldn’t make it out on nights before this one. Tonight is different.

 

Tonight, he’s awake.

 

He bursts up from his cot in a swift move fueled by pure adrenaline and fear. The noise doesn’t wake the others or tip off the hunting wolf, a small mercy, but it does alert the conversing pair in the clearing, who turn and stare at the disturbance.

 

Wild doesn’t pay attention to Time’s open eye, doesn’t care that this is another secret that lies between them, another truth kept.

 

His eyes meet ones that, while they are the same as his own, are weary and tired and so so different.

 

They are eyes that he’s only seen in his memories, when he passed by a mirror and saw someone who he no longer knows, a stranger whose old habits have been ingrained into his muscles and who he can see with every old and faded scar.

 

Wild is frozen in confusion, and the world around him seems to impossibly slow.

 

And suddenly, it’s just them.

 

There are people laying around them, of course. Time was in the middle of some witty remark to break the tension, but now he was, in essence, silenced. There is nothing to interrupt Wild and Link from this moment that they share.

 

Link smiles sadly at him, and he slowly approached. He wasn’t walking, not exactly, though his legs were certainly doing the motions, but his soles never touched the ground.

 

Wild, still frozen, could only watch helplessly.

 

Finally, less than a foot away, Link stopped. He grabbed one of Wild’s hands, grasping it with palms that were cool to the touch, impossibly tangible and all too real.

 

“Hello, Wild. It’s been a long time.”

 

He can’t respond.

 

He doesn't know how to.

 

Link leaned forward and pressed their foreheads together gently. It was a gesture of intimacy that would be expected from a mother comforting a crying child. With his other free hand, Link placed it on Wild’s face and wiped away fat tears that Wild hadn’t even realized were falling. He didn’t know if it was sadness or relief, at the prospect of seeing this person he never really knew and the implications of it.

 

If Link was here, Wild knew that the person Zelda, Bazz, Impa, _everyone_ knew and _relied on_  was truly gone.

 

He suspected he had known it for a while.

 

“Shhhhhhhh,” Link whispered, “It’s okay, you’re okay.”

 

But he wasn’t. He knew he wasn’t. The man before him was the very reason why.

 

All this time, Wild knew he had been missing something. All of the others had the Spirit, Sky’s Spirit. The Spirit of the Hero. They’ve discussed it many times now.

 

Whenever they had those conversations, he felt isolated. His world and his people were so different than everyone else, used to a world that was rugged and rough and dangerous.

 

Wild knew he didn’t have the Hero’s Spirit. He remembered what it felt like to be Link, to be so sure of his divine purpose was and what his life was meant for.

 

Wild wasn’t really sure of much of anything anymore.

 

He knew he didn’t have the Hero’s Spirit, but he knew that Link did. He knows that all the others have it except for him.

 

He knows that he’s having trouble breathing.

 

His body is slightly shaking but Links hand is steady when he guides Wild’s palm to lay flat against his chest.

 

“I wanted to tell you.” Link’s voice, quiet and slightly shaky, is met with silence “I wanted to tell you about me so badly for so long. I just...didn’t know how.”

 

Wild can’t say anything. There are a million things going through his mind at once and unlike the world around them, there’s no sign of it stopping.

 

“Wild, it’s time to let go,” Link squeezed the hand pressed against his chest, “Let go, sweetie.”

 

Wild didn’t know what he needed to let go _of_.

 

“Let go.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Time sped up again.

 

“-guess you don’t have a choice now....oh.”

 

Time, the man, the myth, the legend, surveyed the sudden change of his surroundings. He saw the two people before him, saw Wild’s pained face through a translucent shoulder, and, while he had very little knowledge of the situation, decided to not to act.

 

It wasn’t until Wild’s eyes were drier and heart a little lighter when Link finally stepped away. The sun was far from rising but the light of the full moon made his body shimmer in a way that made Wild afraid that he was going to disappear at any moment.

 

Time sighed, the intense emotion of the moment over, and walked towards Wild. His eye is still open, and as he approaches, Wild can see it clearly.

 

It’s pale, paler than the moon in the sky above them, and while it does not exactly glow it emanates a strange power that feels strange and familiar all at once.

 

Wild, who had gone through entirely too much in the span of twenty minutes and who had been feeling the tendrils of exhaustion weigh down his limbs since the sun had started to set, passed out.

 

And the world went black.

 

* * *

 

Much to Link’s gratitude, Time catches him.

 

He is closer to moving on than he was before. He can hear Mipha’s call every time Wild takes too many hits or bleeds too much and brushes ever closer to death.

 

He’s getting tired, too tired to look after Wild for much longer.

 

He’s grateful that he found the others.

 

He’s grateful that they found him.

 

A cloud passes over the moon and his body flickers weakly.

 

     Link looks to the sky and smiles.

 

It’s almost time.

 

He can’t wait to see her again.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you so much for reading! I hope you liked it, and I also hope you leave a comment, because I wouldn't have written this if I hadn't gotten comments for part 1!!! (especially thank you to the user BluePheonixRising16, who was the final push over the edge.) 
> 
> or, if you're in the server, just @ me (or else i won't see the message)

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!!! 
> 
> I had a blast writing this. Technically, I wrote two versions of a ghost fic, but the first one I didn’t like so much and didn’t really match my narrative style. It also had some body horror and that’s not for everyone. 
> 
> This is meant to be entirely unrelated to my other fic with Time and Hylia, but if you read them in the same universe, they could feasibly be connected! I like to leave a lot to reader interpretation so read it however you want. 
> 
> If it wasn’t clear in the fic, which it may not be, the “lights” are supposed to be people’s souls. When Link died in BoTW, he, well, died. His soul left his body but stayed around. Wild woke up 100 years later with no memories, and he wasn’t really Link anymore, but someone new. 
> 
> This was a mutation of Linni’s “Wild is a redead” Hc from the Linked Universe discord server, so thank her for the inspiration!


End file.
